Todd, Tim and Kellan Cook love Baseball, the Seattle Mariners and trekking around the country to visit stadiums and watch games. These are their stories. #FatherSonBaseball

Results tagged ‘ Chone Figgins ’

After a brief detour through the Metrodome, its back to Spring Training. We still have a few more reports to go from the desert. This one has no real *story* per se, its just a bunch of pictures. It does, however, have a theme: practice. We took a bunch of nice pictures of Mariners doing the hard work of preparing for the 2011 season and its time to share them.

Each morning, the entire Mariners major league camp would report to practice field M3 for a big stretching routine:

You can always expect to see the guys playing a lot of catch at Spring Training:

Above, Ichiro is playing catch with…hmm…probably Milton Bradley on practice field M1.

The Mariners coaching staff hits hours of fungo to the Mariners infielders during Spring Training. Here, Justin Smoak gloves a grounder on the first day of full team workouts on M2:

Josh Wilson got into the action right next to Smoak:

Across the diamond, Chone Figgins — back at his native third base — got hand cuffed by this grounder, but made the play:

Between fields M1 and M2, there is a little half field (infield only). Here, Dustin Ackley practices taking grounders at second base on the short field:

The pitchers spend a lot of time re-learning how to field their position during Spring Training. Here, big Michael Pineda practices his pick off move as a bunch of his colleagues watch:

This next picture is hilarious to me. This was the first day of full squad workouts and the coach (cannot remember which one) said, “First grounder of the season!” and then hit this ball to King Felix Hernandez a/k/a Larry Bernandez:

The look on Felix’s face is priceless. FYI, despite his surprised look, he did catch the ball.

Erik Bedard has been a pleasant surprise this Spring. He is flat out pitching like a stud and finally looking like he might live up to the original hype. Here he is getting in his work in the mega-bullpen between M3 and M4:

Three or four mounds over from Bedard, King Felix was strutting his Cy Young-stuff:

In a little strip of random grass between M2 and M7 (the half field), Ichiro, Dustin Ackley and a couple other guys played a little pepper:

Someone peppered a hot one Ichiro’s way and Ichi had to make an acrobatic catch at close range:

What makes this next picture cool was unintentional and hard to decipher. However, if you click on the picture to enlarge it, you will see that I captured two balls in the air — Figgy gunned a ball to Justin Smoak that appears in the upper lefthand corner of the photo and Brendan Ryan his underhanding a second baseball to 2B:

As I said, lots of pitcher fielding practice. Here, Jason Vargas, Luke French and Brandon League handle hot shots back up the box:

And here is another hilarious picture of King Felix fielding his position — he did not catch this one:

But Ichiro caught this one (during outfielder practice on M5):

You can get so close to your favorite players during Spring Training that its almost ridiculous. Here, Tim played in the warning track dirt just behind Ichiro waiting his turn at the plate:

One day, the guys all came out to practice and the outfielders reported to M6. Ichiro was all set to play catch with Milton Bradley when he realized he’d forgot his glove in the clubhouse. Ichiro’s interpreter, Anthony Suzuki, bolted off to the clubhouse and came cruising back with Ichiro’s glove:

Michael Saunders tracks this ball in the birght Arizona sun during outfielders practice on M6:

More pitcher fielding practice — Erik Bedard doesn’t show the best form while snaring this grounder from the short stop position:

One last group of photos, all of Ichiro. I took the picture of Ichiro in the top left (below)…

…Tim took the other three from close range.

So there you go, a look behind the scenes at Spring Training practice. For my money, practice is where the fun is at Spring Training.

On the second day of the 2008 Cook Grandfather-Father-Son Baseball Roadtrip, we left Cinncinati and headed down to Louisville, Kentucky for a tour of the Louisville Slugger factory. It was awesome. But they don’t allow cameras in the factory, so I don’t have much to share on it. So go check it out for yourself. In addition to the factory, there is an extremely cool Louisville Slugger museum that includes a Babe Ruth bat that has 20+ notches that Ruth carved into it around the Louisville Slugger logo for each homerun Ruth hit with the bat during his record setting 60 homerun 1927 season.

On day three of the roadtrip, we made our way up north to Cleveland, Ohio and…

Well, on second thought, although he is a member of the National Baseball Hall of Fame, maybe you don’t know Averill. He isn’t quite on the same level as the rest included here. He was voted into the National HOF by the veterans committee in 1975, 34 years after his final season. I included Averill because, as his plaque notes, he is the “Earl of Snohomish.”

That’s Snohomish, Washington. I grew up in Edmonds, Washington, which is in Snohomish County. Like Adam Eaton, Averill went to Snohomish High School, which many, many, many years after Averill graduated would eventually be in the same athletic conference, WesCo Triple-A, as my high school, Edmonds-Woodway High School. More on Snohomish County and my former WesCo Triple-A foes later.

Back to the tour. After Heritage Park, we headed to the upper deck so I could take pictures for this panaramic view:

FYI, Heritage Park is at the intersection of the LCF bleachers and the batters’ eye in CF.

Next, it was time for lunch…

…Nachos! A Cook family favorite.

Then it was game time. This was our view from Section 175, Row M, Seats 3-5 at Progressive Field:

A majority of the scoring occurred in the first inning of this game.

The Angels got on the board first. After singles by future-Mariner Chone Figgins, Erick Aybar and Mark Teixeira, and a fielders choice by “Big Daddy Vladdy” Guererro, the Angels led 2-0.

The top of the Angels order would do most of the damage for the Angels on the day. Figgins was 2-5 with 2 runs scored, Aybar was 2-5 with 1 run, and Teixeira was 2-4 with 1 RBI.

Then the teams switched sides and it was the Indians’ turn. The Indians would match the Angels on a 2-run single by future-Mariner Franklin Gutierrez. Gutierrez would eventually go 3-3 on the day.

The crowd was pretty low key…

…but Tim can always find something to amaze him at the ballpark. I have no clue what has his attention here, but I think its a funny picture.

In the bottom of the third, Ryan Garko hit a single…

…that scored Jamey Carroll for the Indians’ first lead of the day. Franklin would follow with another single. I didn’t know it yet, but that guy rules.

Soon, it was time for ice cream helmets…

…Tim beat the heat by eating his ice cream sitting on the ground in the shady beneath his seat.

We’d driven to Cleveland in the morning from a camp ground an hour or so west of Columbus, Ohio. Tim hadn’t napped so I knew he would crash at some point during this game. That time came in the 4th or 5th inning.

I took him up to the concourse behind our section to get him out of the sun. He fell asleep sitting on my shoulders and he stayed that way for 3 entire innings.

While Tim was napping, the Indians and Angels scored their final runs of the day. In the top of the fifth, Figgins singled and then scored on a passed ball by Sal Fasano. That tied the score at 3-3.

Fasano would get his redeption by scoring the winning run for the Indians on a sixth inning single by Indians center fielder Grady Sizemore.

Speaking of Sizemore, you know where he grew up? In Everett, Washington. Yep, that’s the county seat of Snohomish County. Sizemore graduated from my WesCo rival, Cascade High School.

Aside from rejuvenating Tim for the rest of the day, something else good came out of Tim’s nap. In that picture above to the left, do you see the large usher in the green shirt and the dark-haired guy sitting under the “PR” in the “Express” sign? Those two chatted the entire Tim I was standing up there. The seated guy had a son (sitting right in front of me in the picture). So the usher mentioned to him that it was KIDS RUN THE BASES DAY!!! I had no clue. The only advertised promotion was an art kit for kids. Tim had never run the bases at a big league field (for that matter, neither had I), so I was extremely excited. The usher told us where to go toward the end of the game to get in line.

After Tim woke up, we went back to our seats for a little bit. I told my dad about it being Kids Run the Bases Day. We decided to make our way over to the RF corner where the line would form. On our way, an usher took a picture of us…

…and since we were in Cleveland (and it was 2008), Tim wore his hat like C.C. Sabbathia.

We missed the uneventful ninth inning because we were in a long line snaking up the switch-back walkway from the field level to the upper deck behind the RF concourse. Notably, Jeremy Sowers got the win for the Indians taking his season record to 2-6. His only other win on the season was the Mariners-Indians game we had attended in Seattle back on July 19, 2008.

Anyway, the line finally started moving and we snaked our way under the stadium, and passed a sign that read:

ON THE JOB SAFETY BEGINS HERE

This Department Has Worked 19 Days Without a Lost Time Accident.

ACCIDENTS ARE AVOIDABLE

The “19” was a red digital light that counts up each day from the last accident.

Anyway, eventually, we made our way out of the tunnels and through an entrance at the side of the visitors’ bullpen…

…we walked out onto the RF warning track. My dad took our picture against the OF wall (a picture we now try to duplicate at other parks)…

…and I took my Dad’s picture with the warning track and OF grass behind him.

And much to my delight, since Tim was only two, I got to run with him…

…I gotta admit it, I was at least as excited about it as Tim. It was really cool to be running behind Tim around the same bases we would eventually see Ken Griffey, Jr. circle after his 624th homerun.

After circling the bases, we met up with my dad and got a few more picture before we left the field of play.

Between the Angels loss (yeah, the Mariners were already out of it but its always good to see a division rival lose) and running the bases, it was an outstanding second game on the roadtrip.

We capped off the day at the KOA in Streetsboro, Ohio where my dad helped Tim roast the first smore of his young life:

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